Poker and Malta Get On Very Well
Many of the Day 1A players just arrived yesterday, and a large proportion of them are visiting the island for the first time. They may not know what to do, but that Malta is a truly a brilliant place to play poker.
The Portomaso Casino (specifically) is attached to the huge Hilton Hotel, and they share a large conference space that’s perfect to host a modern European Poker Tour festival. If you’re unfortunate enough not to be staying in the Hilton then there’s a huge amount of other options within a five-minute radius. There's also great food options, the weather is amazing for nines months a year, and everyone you meet seems friendly. Basically it has everything one would want to host a poker tournament. One can't help but wonder why the EPT has taken so long to come.
Let’s forget the EPT for a minute though and look at the broader picture — the history the island has with poker. The EPT has been the first to do many things, but coming to Malta is not one of them.
The Portomaso Casino has been hosting poker events as far back as 2008 when the Malta Poker Tour held three €100,000 guaranteed events. Canadian’s Tommy Pavlicek has the honor of winning the first-ever event, taking home €30,000 in the process. The next 18 months saw similar festivals held, and then something special happened to the island, the Italian poker boom.
Malta is around 180 kilometers away from Sicily and less than an hour by plane from many major Italian cities. It’s also free from any regulatory restrictions, so Italian poker tournament organizers had found a great place to host events. It wasn’t long before PokerStars and Pagano Events took notice, bringing the Italian Poker Tour (IPT) to these shores for the first time in November 2010, during the tour’s second season. They held five events with a €2,200 Main Event won by Michal Polchlopek for €190,000. It was a success and the tour has been back many times since.
Almost every month, in the four and half years since that first IPT, the Portomaso casino has hosted poker events and not just those affiliated to online poker sites. The Finnish, Swedish and Israeli poker championships have all been here at least once, all leaving the tight regulatory restrictions of their own countries for the open arms of Malta.
Despite the fact that poker has a lot of skill to it, luck also plays a big part in the game. That means – for better or worse – there’s always been a crossover with the gaming industry. Back in 2011 the Maltese government introduced favorable corporate and gaming tax regimes in attempt to boost inward investment. It worked, as many start-ups and established companies – including PokerStars – flocked here and set up offices.
The gaming boom has continued to this day and the island is fast gaining a reputation as the gaming capital of Europe. The fact that the European economy is recovering fast as well means this could well be just the beginning of a very fruitful relationship between Malta, poker, gaming, PokerNews and hopefully you!